Rules Take Cut Out Of Timber Sales White House’s Tightening Of Salvage Regulations Adds To Supply Uncertainty

A Clinton administration move to tighten rules on salvage logging has cut the volume of timber sold on the Clearwater and Nez Perce national forests.

The cutbacks add to the uncertainty about federal log supplies facing northern Idaho’s timber industry.

Conservationists say they will keep a close eye out for the revival of the same timber sales in coming months.

The change meant the Forest Service, which ended its fiscal year Monday, offered for sale 32 million board feet of timber from the Clearwater instead of its 74.5 million target.

On the Nez Perce, the agency sold 19.7 million instead of the 24 million targeted.

A signal of both demand and uncertainty about future supplies, recent prices for timber topped official estimates on both north central Idaho national forests.

“The sales we’ve sold during the last month are being bid up two or three times the advertised value,” said Dallas Emch, a Clearwater timber staff officer in Orofino.

“We didn’t have anything we offered that didn’t sell,” said Ihor Mereszczak, Nez Perce timber staff officer in Grangeville.

A July memo by Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman changed the administration’s policy on timber sales planned as a result of a law passed in 1995.

Supporters called the 1995 law a way to speed the recovery of dead and dying timber.

Opponents called it logging without the restraints of environmental laws.

“We were pretty disappointed when the decision came down,” said Bill Mulligan, president of Three Rivers Timber in Kamiah.

“Right now we’re waiting to see what will happen with the two forests, whether they’ll be able to make up that volume next year.”